(R.I.P.) Jack Lalanne dies at 96

Reuters) - Jack LaLanne, a one-time sugar-holic who became a television fitness guru preaching exercise and healthy diet to a generation of American housewives, died on Sunday at age 96, his daughter said.

LaLanne, who became U.S. television fixture in his close-fitting jumpsuit starting in 1959 and came to be regarded as the father of the modern fitness movement, succumbed to pneumonia following a brief illness at his home in Morro Bay, along the California's central coast.

"He was surrounded by his family and passed very peacefully and in no distress ... and with the football game on Sunday, so everything was normal," Yvonne LaLanne, 66, told Reuters.

She said her father had remained active until a few months ago, including the taping of a recent public TV special.

Well into his 90s, LaLanne exercised for two hours a day. A typical workout would be 90 minutes of weightlifting and 30 minutes of swimming, changing his routine every 30 days.

He preached the gospel of exercise, raw vegetables and clean living long after his contemporaries had traded in their bicycles for nursing home beds.

"I can't die," LaLanne would say. "It would ruin my image."

LaLanne was born Francois Henri LaLanne on September 26, 1914, in San Francisco, the son of French immigrants. He said he grew into a "sugar-holic" who suffered terrible headaches, mood swings and depression.

In desperation when he was 14, LaLanne's mother took him to hear health lecturer Paul Bragg, who urged followers to exercise and eat unprocessed foods.

The young LaLanne swore off white flour, most fat and sugar and began eating more fruits and vegetables. By age 15, he had built a backyard gym of climbing ropes, chin-up bars, sit-up machines and weights.

Soon, LaLanne, who was only 5 feet, 6 inches tall, was playing high school football. He added weight-lifting to recover from a football injury and was hooked.

LaLanne opened the nation's first modern health club in Oakland, California, in 1936. It had a gym, juice bar and health food store. Soon there were 100 gyms nationwide.

Without bothering with patents, LaLanne designed his own exercise equipment, which he had built by a blacksmith. In 1951, he started using television to get the first generation of couch potatoes to try jumping jacks, push-ups and sit-ups.

"The Jack LaLanne Show," which went national in 1959, showed housewives how to work out and eat right, becoming a staple of U.S. daytime television during a 34-year run.

He also was known for a series of promotional fitness stunts. At age 45, in 1959, he did 1,000 push-ups and 1,000 chin-ups in 86 minutes. In 1984 a 70-year-old LaLanne had himself shackled and handcuffed and towed 70 boats 1.5 miles in Long Beach Harbor.

LaLanne said in 2007 his focus was always to help people the way Paul Bragg had helped him, adding, "Billy Graham is for the hereafter, I'm for the here and now!"

Jack Lalanne was decades ahead of his time and and one of the patriarchs of the modern fitness craze. You will be missed.

"It's a bunch of bull. How do you know what's really organic? Today, there's all these impurities in the water and the air. The water for the fruits and vegetables has junk in it. If you get enough vitamins and minerals out of normal food and whole grains, and you get enough proteins and exercise (that's the key) then nature builds up a tolerance to all of these things. It's survival of the fittest. You can't have everything perfect, that's impossible, but the fit survive. The fit can handle the impurities in the air and in the water, but the poor people who are sick, it really affects them more."

I always got a kick out of this guy. If I end up living that long I hope I'm as healthy and happy as he was in his later years, and not some pathetic, miserable old **** in a retirement home.
Keep working out boys!

RIP Jack

" If one wants to have a friend one must also want to wage war for him: and to wage war one must be capable of being an enemy." - Fr. Nietzsche 'On The Friend' Thus Spake Zarathustra

Jack has been one of my hero's since I was a boy. His show was on before the cartoons on Saturday morning, and if I got up that early I would do jumping-jacks with him (1977ish). I still have and use my Juice Tiger Juicer. In the 1980's he did an interview in Playboy Mag, which I cut out and used to have in a scrapbook of exercise stuff I used to inspire me. This lead me to his read from his mentor, Dr. Bragg, who is actually the true guru of modern American Fitness and Exercise. Jack was the man.

I guess my flag will have to stay at half mast for another week.....

"If anything is gained from this, it should be you both wanting to get better so you can make up for how crappy you are now." KidSpatula about the Sirc vs DTT Gong Sau Event